1. Field
The field relates to a plasma display and a driving apparatus thereof.
2. Description of the Related Technology
A plasma display is a display device with a plasma display panel for displaying characters or images which uses plasma generated by a gas discharge. A plasma display panel includes a plurality of discharge cells arranged in a matrix format.
The plasma display is driven by dividing a frame into a plurality of subfields and displays images by the combination of weight values of the subfields that constitute the display operation among the plurality of subfields. Each subfield includes a reset period, an address period, and a sustain period. During the reset period of each subfield, cells are initialized in order to stably perform an address discharge. During the address period of each subfield, in order to select light emitting cells and non-light emitting cells, scan pulses are sequentially applied to a plurality of scan electrodes, and during a sustain period, in order to display an image, sustain pulses alternately having a high level voltage and a low level voltage are applied to the electrodes to perform sustain discharge.
When a switch for applying a voltage of the scan pulse (referred to as “scan voltage” hereinafter) in the address period is turned on, a current path may be formed to the switch for applying the scan voltage through a body diode of a switch for applying a ground voltage (e.g., 0V). A special switch is connected between the switch for applying the ground voltage and the switch for applying the scan voltage to cut off the current path. The special switch is also used to separate a negative voltage such as scan voltage and a positive voltage such as high level voltage. Thus, the special switch should be one having an threshold tolerance above the difference between the negative voltage and the positive voltage, and the cost of such a switch is high.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.